O’Byrne decided to resign a week after The Post first reported that he failed to pay his taxes for five years – a period in which he claimed to have suffered from clinical depression.

O’Byrne’s hopes for political survival deteriorated two days ago, when his lawyers revealed his tax debt had actually reached nearly $300,000 – $100,000 more than he originally disclosed – and that he had only paid it off this week.

A suggestion by O’Byrne’s attorney that his client suffered from “non-filer syndrome” also brought widespread ridicule and calls for O’Byrne’s resignation.

O’Byrne’s ouster amounts to the first major shake-up within the Paterson administration, barely seven months after the former lieutenant governor took over in the wake of Eliot Spitzer’s resignation.

A former Jesuit priest with close ties to the Kennedy family, O’Byrne, 49, was Paterson’s most trusted advisor and confident inside the administration.

He has worked for Paterson for several years in various capacities and the two men were extremely close.

His departure leaves the legally-blind governor with a huge management vacuum as he grapples with a financial crisis that blasted a $1.2 billion hole in the state’s budget.